I’ve been quite keen on cooking since I was about 15. Most recipes that I use regularly come from very old cook books or are handed down through the family.

Things really took off in 1985 (the year of Live Aid) when our sixth form at Dronfield Henry Fanshaw School decided that we would make things - anything that we could - to sell to raise funds to send off to Bob Geldof for the Live Aid appeal. I made two Christmas Puddings, one of which was bought by a teacher. The following year the same teacher asked me to make four for him as he had liked it so much and so had his family. The year after, when I had left school, I got a plea from not only the same teacher again but four or five others who had also heard of the puds and wanted several each. Things spiralled over the following few years and by 1994 I was making 500 puddings each year to sell for charity. The last five years the money has gone to The Albert Kennedy Trust to help their work with homeless and abused LGBT young people.

After 27 years of making my Christmas Puddings, I’m finally sharing my Vegetarian, organic, charity pudding recipe with the world via this page; should you choose to make the puddings for anyone other than yourself I would be grateful if you would make a donation to the National Gardens Scheme in recognition of the recipe.

A word about measurements and ingredients though: I can’t cope with Metric for cooking so all of my measurements are in pounds and ounces. Where I am forced to convert I use 500g = 1 Lb, which of course it does not (454g = 1Lb) so if you are buying something in metric packs you’re looking for 500g where I put 1Lb. I also use good old fashioned cutlery so my tablespoons are probably bigger than 25ml which is I believe the official conversion and my teaspoons are certainly a very generous 5ml! You may find that you need slightly more liquid than you expect in recipes using these measures. For oven temperatures I only ever cook by gas and I would not have a clue what the Gas Mark equivalents are for electric. On the rare occasions that I have been forced to offer a conversion for someone I have used the Be-Ro conversions and these have always seemed to work fine. Finally the ingredients: of choice I always buy organic free range eggs in size large, so where eggs are mentioned small or medium will probably be inadequate. I also always use organic skimmed milk and vegetarian ingredients, so cooking fat for example is always butter or Trex. I’m sure that lard and other animal fats will work fine in most cases, but I’ve never tried them so I can’t vouch for the results.